


What If

by FangirlFromTheUnderworld



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: AU kind of, Bellatrix tortures Hermione, Canon, Draco is still a butthead, F/M, Hurt, Malfoy Manor, Strong Hermione, The Deathly Hallows, death eater draco, deatheater malfoy, dramione - Freeform, guilty malfoy, hermione - Freeform, very slight dramione
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-15
Updated: 2016-09-15
Packaged: 2018-08-15 03:36:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8040964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FangirlFromTheUnderworld/pseuds/FangirlFromTheUnderworld
Summary: Draco Watched Bellatrix torture the Mudblood with a sick expression. He wished he was anywhere but here. He wished he was anyone but himself.





	What If

**Author's Note:**

> This is a first and only draft I apologize for how crappy it is.

Draco watched with a sick expression as his aunt hunched over the sobbing form on the floor. His hands shook hard enough that holding his wand was difficult, eyes transfixed on the scene in front of him. Bellatrix jabbed her wand down at the mudblood, yelling the curse again with a snarl. Draco flinched as Hermione let out another horrible shriek of agony, writhing on the floor as the Cruciatus curse did it’s job. Bellatrix wasn’t laughing as she normally would have as she watched Granger wail. The curse lifted with a wave of her wand and she walked back to Hermione who’s face was coated in tears, and crouched gracefully. Snatching up fists of her hair, Bellatrix hissed, “Tell me girl, and it’ll stop. Where-” She slapped Hermione, who had started to moan pitifully, “-did you get that sword?” 

Draco’s stomach turned over as he watched from the shadows, as Hermione gasped out “We didn’t take anything! We-w-we found it!” hiccuping sobs punctuating her words. She kept saying that over and over again, and Bellatrix would wrend wails and screams from her and ask her again to hear the same response. Draco wished she could come up with something new to say, she wasn't helping her case by repeteing the same tired phrases over and over again. Throwing down Hermione’s hair and smacking the victim’s head into the dark oak floorboards, Bellatrix stood and pointed her wand back at Hermione’s weeping face. 

“You filthy little mudblood!” She shrieked, and Draco looked at her face for the first time in minutes. Her gaunt looks were contorted into a mask of hate fear and fury, and she kicked Hermione in the ribs with her pointy-toed high heels. Hermione groaned and slid a bit on the floor, but didn’t move other than that. “You will tell me where you got that sword! You will die before I let you out of this room. And it will be most painful, I assure you. Maybe less, if you spill your guts now. I ask again, how did you get the sword?”

This was not what Draco thought it would be like. If he had known, he would never had joined. Not that he had had much choice, as the Dark Lord himself had chosen him for the mission. To deny the order would have been suicide. But now he wished Snape had never killed Dumbledore. He wished he had taken Dumbledore up on his final offer to Draco, protection for him and his family from the Death Eaters from the Order of the Phoenix. It would’ve been so much better than this, watching people be tortured in his entrance hall, being mocked and threatened by the Dark Lord himself, living in fear of people in his own house and the mark burned into his own arm. He could barely sleep, the circles under his eyes were like pockets. The retribution on his family for the mistake his father made at the Ministry almost two years ago had been swift and terrible, he still woke up from rare sleep with the screams of his parents ringing in his ears. He wished he had never joined. He wished he had been ignorant of this lifestyle forever, a pompous Slytherin bully he now knew he was. 

Hermione’s screams were loud enough to partly mask the yelling from the basement/dungeon where Weasley and Potter were shouting their heads off for their friend, going from outraged to scared to desperate as Hermione’s screams progressively got louder. The threats and curses called up from the basement had grown creative for a while, Weasly in particular said things that would've had his mouth scrubbed out by his mother. The had grown suspiciously silent now, maybe accepting their fate. Or forming some clever plan to save their muggle born friend and get the Malfoys in fatal trouble again. Draco didn’t know which he wanted to happen. 

Bellatrix was screaming at Hermione, who was screaming back though for a different reason. Bellatrix slashed outwards with her wand and Hermione skittered back a few feet as blood oozed from the fresh but on her chest. Draco could barely watch it. 

It was funny how different it was to make fun of the muggle born before potions class compared to this. Draco never would have thought he would feel anything but hatred for Granger, but here he was with fear and sympathy and a longing to make it stop in his heart as he watched her writhe on the floor. He didn’t want this to happen, whatever he may have said before. Draco had noticed, when Bellatrix had first been questioning her, how thin she had grown. There were pockets under the mudblood eyes that rivaled his own, and her hair was tangled. Obviously whatever she and Potter and Weasly had been doing hadn't been very healthy, she looked like a different girl from the one he watched board the Hogwarts express last year. There was something in her face that was different too. A hardness, like she had seen more frustration and troubles than a girl her age should. Every once in awhile her eyes would land on his and he’d look away, hating himself for being so weak. When he looked back she would always be looking somewhere else. She didn’t beg him for help once. 

Bellatrix was swooping down on Hermione one last time. “Fine. I can see you shall be of no use. I only regret you did not tell me what I need to know, for it would have been fun watching you burn by the Dark Lord’s hand. We shall just have to try the blood traitor instead.” Bellatrix stood and aimed her wand. “Avada-” 

 

Draco impulsively stumbled forwards a few steps, with the stupid idea in his head to stop his aunt, fear in his heart for the classmate he barely knew as the wall behind him exploded. Marble black as the night shattered and rained down on the people in the entrance hall, showering an unconscious Hermione. Draco was blown forward, landing only a couple feet away from the prone body of the girl who was supposed to be his enemy. fog seemed to descend over the world as his brain joggled in his skull. Once his head stopped swimming from the force of the explosion, Draco looked up and saw Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Luna Lovegood charging into battle. The stinging jinx had worn off of Potter’s face, he looked normal if a little thinner than usual, except his features were hardened, twisted in a mask of fury and determination Draco didn't know could exist there. Weasley was firing jets of red and orange light from his wand, he was as tall as ever, his clothes patches and parts of his face bleeding onto them. His freckled features were nothing but hatred and fear, though much less of the latter. Lovegood charged into battle serenely, with less of the conviction the other two posessed, blue and yellow and red sparkles soared out of her wand. Her expression was happy, if a little frightened, her cheeks were hollower and her eyes luminous, the same as the last time Draco saw her. The three started dueling the 4 or so Death Eaters in the hall, including Bellatrix who was shrieking orders to the others. No one had noticed Draco. 

He crawled to Hermione, leaning over her and checking clumsily for a pulse. His wand was miraculously still in his hand, though the pale skin was shaking harder than ever before. He barely felt the weak thump of her heart, and sighed in relief. She wasn’t dead yet. Her breathing was laboured, and Draco pointed his wand at her throat and murmured shakily, “Anapneo.” 

Her airway seemed to clear. And suddenly, from somewhere close by someone shouted “Oi! Get away from her! Hermione!” And Weasley came barreling towards Draco. Distaste curled in his chest at the sight of the red head. He waved his hands in the air in the sign of surrender half-heartidly, then turned back to Hermione. She was still out cold. 

Ron arrived and pointed his wand directly at Malfoy’s heart. “You get away from her or I’ll-” he growled, but Draco interrupted. 

“You’ll what, kill me?” He asked snarkily, in contrast to the concern in his throat about how pale Hermione was. “I was only helping her. Making sure she didn’t choke on her own spit. In other words, more than you were doing.” 

Ron flushed red and still had his wand level with Draco’s heart. “Why should I trust you? You could've just obliviated her or-or-” Ron kept glancing at Hermione with more and more concern. 

Draco gestured at her prone body. “See for yourself.” 

Ron dropped to Hermione’s side, brushing the hair out of her face quickly before checking her pulse just as Draco had. A strange unwelcome pang of jealousy went through Draco and he turned away, into the battle that had taken place in his home. As he shot a jinx at Potter, he wondered what it would have been like if he had taken Dumbledore’s offer.


End file.
